[shoplink 10949 ebay][/shoplink]

While I am “studying” the world of third party lenses I can use on my NEX-7 I found a bunch of modified lenses that do fit native on NEX cameras without the use of any adapter. The one pictured on top is the Kodak Ektar 44mm f/3.5 you can find on eBay (Click here). It’s kind of sexy on a silver NEX but definitely to slow for my ambition. But the same seller modified two more Ektar lenses. The [shoplink 10950 ebay]Ektar 47mm f/2.0 (Click here to see the auction)[/shoplink] and the [shoplink 10951 ebay]Ektar 50mm f/2.0 (Click here to see the auction)[/shoplink]. For real speed fans take a look at the native E-mount [shoplink 10952 ebay]Kowa 55mm f/1.1 lens (Click here to see the auction)[/shoplink].

Anyway, I will soon post an article that will explain which lens works well on NEX cameras. There are possible issues related to the use of third party lenses you should be aware of!

Good morning SAr readers. ope you recovered well from the new years party :)

I was checking some stores to see if the A77 is in Stock and found that unexpected new book: Sony SLT A65/A77 for Dummies!! (Click here to see it on Amazon). I guess everybody knows the book series so why should we care? Simple, that is a terrific popular series of books and if the Sony A77/A65 manages to get there than this means that Sony really got a hit with those new SLT cameras. I will skip the A77 and wait until the full frame SLT is out. Meanwhile I am testing the NEX-7 and will post my first impressions next week. One thing I can tell you know, I am extremely positively surprised by the EVF technology. I didn’t think it would be that good! I was sure I would be one of those guys saying..damn I want my classic optical viewfinder back! But honestly, I was wrong. You Sony engineers made a terrific work here!

P.S.: There is a more serious A77 book from David Busch you can preorder on Amazon (Click here).

2011 is now over and I wish all our readers a nice peaceful New Year!

2012 will be a year of change in many aspects (see the current economic crisis). I hope we can grow out of the problems in a positive way. Coming back to less serious things I wish you to have fun on that little website named SonyAlphaRumors. A place where people can have some fun discussing the new Sony products. I am sure we will have plenty moments of excitement (and some of delusion).

So dear readers, let’s jump into that damn cool 2012!

Andrea ;)

While I am still deciding what kind of third party lens I should buy for my NEX-7 I found two crazy adapters I never saw before. One is the [shoplink 10924 ebay]Wallimex Tilt-shift adapter for Nikon lenses (Click here to see on eBay)[/shoplink] and the other one is the [shoplink 10925 ebay]Kipon EOS adapter with built-in manual aperture ring (Click here to see on eBay)[/shoplink]. I have no use for both but maybe you could be interested to get those.

By the way, thanks for all emails you sent me with your third party lens suggestions. I will sum them and post your findings on SAR soon. I really learned a lot form you and I will try to help SAR readers to figure out which lens works best on Sony NEX cameras.

In Japan (and in Japan only) you can get detailed reports about the camera sales. Bcnranking (via 1001noisyc) posted the top 20 of the most sold cameras between January 1st and December 20th. Four cameras are listed on it. The Sony NEX-5 (Pos 6), the Sony A55 (Pos 13), the Sony NEX-C3 (Pos 17) and the Sony NEX-3 (Pos 17). A wonder how that ranking would have looked if the NEX-7 and A77 wouldn’t have been stopped by the terrible Thai flood.

It’s still a mystery for me why we cannot have such detailed sales reports in other countries too. As you already know the only place I can check to see if a camera is popular or not is the very fluctuating Amazon ranking:
Amazon US ranking (Click here), Amazon DE ranking (Click here), Amazon UK ranking (Click here), Amazon FR ranking (Click here), Amazon IT ranking (Click here), Amazon ES ranking (Click here).

Overall it looks like European and American markets are more “conservative” and less subject to adopt new technologies. The mirrorless and SLT cameras aren’t popular as in Japan. But I think cameras like the NEX-7 and the future A99 can slowly change this in “western” countries too. It’s time to get rid of that Canon-Nikon duopoly!

Hurray! I got my NEX-7! As you see I got the body only and I am still figuring out what kind of lens I should use on it. And I have a request to you readers. I want to spend my money on lenses I can use on different systems. That’s why I am looking to get M-mount lenses that can fit via adapter on any current ASP-C NEX or future full frame NEX (or hybrid mount) camera. I usually don’t spend a lot of money on digital cameras, but I am willing to invest in good lenses because a good lens lasts forever!

But it’s not an easy task as you might think. Some lenses do have rear nodal points that do not match perfectly on cameras. If that happens then you get huge vignetting and what’s worse color shifting on the corners. Most M-mount lenses have been designed for film cameras like the [shoplink 10898 ebay]Leica M7[/shoplink] or [shoplink 10899 ebay]Zeiss Ikon[/shoplink]. That’s why I would like to collect your stories with those lenses to see which one fits better on NEX cameras. There are many Leica M-mount lens which are very beautiful but far to expensive for me. As I often shot for work in “dangerous” situation I am not willing to risk to get robbed of a $6.000 lens! Here is the list of M-mount lenses I am looking for:

Zeiss ZM
[shoplink 10875 ebay]Distagon T* 2,8/15 ZM (Click here to see price on eBay)[/shoplink].
[shoplink 9803 ebay]Distagon T* 4/18 ZM (Click here to see price on eBay)[/shoplink].
[shoplink 9804 ebay]Biogon T* 2,8/21 ZM (Click here to see price on eBay)[/shoplink].
[shoplink 9804 ebay]C Biogon T* 4,5/21 ZM (Click here to see price on eBay)[/shoplink].
[shoplink 9805 ebay]Biogon T* 2,8/25 ZM (Click here to see price on eBay)[/shoplink].
[shoplink 9806 ebay]Biogon T* 2,8/28 ZM  (Click here to see price on eBay)[/shoplink].
[shoplink 9808 ebay]Biogon T* 2/35 ZM (Click here to see price on eBay)[/shoplink].
[shoplink 9808 ebay]C Biogon T* 2,8/35 ZM (Click here to see price on eBay)[/shoplink].
[shoplink 9809 ebay]C Sonnar T* 1,5/50 ZM  (Click here to see price on eBay)[/shoplink].
[shoplink 9809 ebay]Planar T* 2/50 ZM (Click here to see price on eBay)[/shoplink].
[shoplink 9810 ebay]Sonnar T* 2/85 ZM  (Click here to see price on eBay)[/shoplink].
[shoplink 9810 ebay]Tele-Tessar T* 4/85 ZM (Click here to see price on eBay)[/shoplink].

Minolta
[shoplink 10876 ebay]28mm f/2.8 M-Rokkor (Click here to see price on eBay)[/shoplink].
[shoplink 10877 ebay]40mm f/2 M-Rokkor (Click here to see price on eBay)[/shoplink].
[shoplink 10878 ebay]90mm f/4 M-Rokkor (Click here to see price on eBay)[/shoplink].

Konica
[shoplink 10879 ebay]21mm f/3.4 Hexanon (Click here to see price on eBay)[/shoplink].
[shoplink 10880 ebay]28mm f/2.8 Hexanon (Click here to see price on eBay)[/shoplink].
[shoplink 10881 ebay]35mm f/2.0 Hexanon (Click here to see price on eBay)[/shoplink].
[shoplink 10882 ebay]50mm f/2.0 Hexanon (Click here to see price on eBay)[/shoplink].
[shoplink 10883 ebay]50mm f/1.2 Hexanon (Click here to see price on eBay)[/shoplink].
[shoplink 10884 ebay]90mm f/2.8 Hexanon (Click here to see price on eBay)[/shoplink].

Voigtländer
[shoplink 10885 ebay]12mm f/5.6 Ultra Wide Heliar Aspherical II (Click here to see price on eBay)[/shoplink]
[shoplink 10886 ebay]15mm f/4.5 Super Wide Heliar II (Click here to see price on eBay)[/shoplink]
[shoplink 10887 ebay]21mm f/4 Color-Skopar P type (Click here to see price on eBay)[/shoplink]
[shoplink 10888 ebay]25mm f/4 Color-Skopar P type (Click here to see price on eBay)[/shoplink]
[shoplink 10889 ebay]28mm f/2.0 Ultron (Click here to see price on eBay)[/shoplink]
[shoplink 10890 ebay]35mm f/1.2 Aspherical Nokton (Click here to see price on eBay)[/shoplink]
[shoplink 10891 ebay]35mm f/1.4 Nokton classic (Click here to see price on eBay)[/shoplink]
[shoplink 10892 ebay]35mm f/2.5 Color-Skopar P type II (Click here to see price on eBay)[/shoplink]
[shoplink 10893 ebay]40mm f/1.4 Nokton classic (Click here to see price on eBay)[/shoplink]
[shoplink 10894 ebay]50mm f/2.0 collapsible Heliar (Click here to see price on eBay)[/shoplink]
[shoplink 10895 ebay]50mm f/1.1 Nokton (Click here to see price on eBay)[/shoplink]
[shoplink 10896 ebay]75mm f/1.8 Heliar (Click here to see price on eBay)[/shoplink]

Send me your stories at sonyalpharumors@gmail.com and I will post them! Thanks!

A note for all current “classic” Alpha camera user. I am not going to buy the A77 for one simple reason, because I want the A99 ;)

Dario just sent me this incredible story:

“Hi, I just want to let you know that yesterday after accidentally damaging the mirror of my A55 with the Eclipse cleaning fluid, I took out the mirror and tried other materials to replace it while I’m waiting for a new mirror. Long story short, food wrap (!) works just almost like the Sony’s mirror: sometimes the AF guesses a little, but most of the time is perfect, and It’s a lot more transparent, so I really don’t get what sony tries to sell us with their 70€ Hi-Tech mirror…
However, food wrap it’s a bit opaque, so the pictures have a slightly soft-focus effect when a bright light hits it. In the next days I’ll try other transparent films: expecially I want to try the plastic protective film for cellphones, I think it’s gonna be a perfect alternative for those who don’t need 100% AF accuracy (although I think it’s almost the same) and improved ISO performance.
Here you can see some pictures of the conversion.

damaged mirror: http://img440.imageshack.us/img440/6361/dsc4616l.jpg

removed mirror: http://img715.imageshack.us/img715/7586/dsc4619z.jpg

food wrap: http://img812.imageshack.us/img812/8836/dsc4621l.jpg (this picture was taken with AF, with the “wrap mirror” already in place, notice the glowing effect on the reflections)

the wrapped mirror: http://img845.imageshack.us/img845/7899/dsc4654.jpg

and: http://img17.imageshack.us/img17/1484/dsc4655m.jpg

mirror mounted: http://img252.imageshack.us/img252/8425/1003321v.jpg

Tell me if you are interested, so I will continue to inform you about this experiment.”

Damn, that sounds interesting!